All The Ice Cream You Can Eat
by Miss Woodford
Summary: A trifle AUish. An Alphonsecentric story set between episode 51, and the movie. To make up for the angst of The End Is The Beginning. To say more would give it all away. Now complete.
1. Chapter 1

**All The Ice Cream You Can Eat**

**Disclaimer: **I don't own FMA nor any of the characters within; except the OC's I've created for this story. I just like to play around in it's world for awhile.

**Warning:** Set between the series and the film, this story contains mild spoilers. May not be totally accurate as I hadn't seen episodes 50/51 at the time I wrote it.

**Author's note**: I don't know what made me recall my own tonsillectomy, back when I was 7, but the memories wouldn't leave me be, and I thought it would make a good Alphonse-centric story (because we don't have enough of 'em)

**Rating**: T, for mild cursing and thermometers made to go places they shouldn't. Just to be safe.

**Props to**: BlackMercifulFaerie for the title

Chapter One - _Prologue_

Ignorance is sometimes bliss...

Rose brought him back to Risembool from that chamber of horrors which saw his brother's death, and his rebirth. Thenin turn, Al's own"rebirth", followed by Edward's disappearance through the Gate. It was a blessing in disguise he couldn't remember any of it. For a while, Alphonse Elric was a very happy ten year old - he was back in Risembool with Winry, Granny Pinako, and Den; and even Rose had decided to stay with her baby. He couldn't remember a thing, not even a fleeting glimpse of anything past the day he and Brother had decided to attempt a forbidden Human Transmutation.

Which is whyhe couldn't understand the shadows which flitted over everyone's faces whenever the subject of Brother came up - Alphonse had this unshakable faith in his soul that Brother - wherever he was - was alive and all right. He would look at the photos Winry had taken since the night she told him everything had gone wrong. The night of the violent thunderstorm when Granny Pinako had opened the door to find Al - his soul trapped in a suit of armor, holding his maimed brother, and pleading "Granny! Please help my brother! He's bleeding to death!"

Photos of a scowling Brother ("he really didn't like having his picture taken after what had happened" Winry explained) dressed in almost completely unrelieved black - like he was already in mourning - those ridiculous elevator boots - and that long red coat. Brother had left the coat behind on his last visit to Risembool, and Alphonse, who couldn't remember Brother other than the active laughing boy he used to be, began sleeping with the coat at night because it smelled like him. Then he started wearing it, over black clothing similar to Brother's, and he stopped submitting to a trim every two weeks. The day his hair became long enough to wear in a ponytail was the day Alphonse truly felt as one with his vanished sibling.

For a few months after his return to his natal village, Alphonse was largely content, and busy re-acquainting himself with the world of sensation. The cool water of the Rain River, sun warm on his face, the soft grass against his bare feet, the sight of Rose's baby starting to crawl, Granny Pinako's smile, and best (to him) of all, the taste of good food. Even when he caught a cold, he felt a perverse enjoyment in the feeling of a good strong sneeze.

But all good things come to an end, and Alphonse eventually began to feel something was missing. He began having strange dreams where he saw the faces of people, and views of places he didn't recognize, and most of all, he would hear a naggingly familiar voice.

It was on the tip of his tongue, but he just couldn't place it, the harder he tried, the more difficult it was to pin an identity to that voice. It was very frustrating to him, and he found himself getting snappish during the day towards the ones he loved and cared about. He was becoming more and more distressed about it untilone night the voice said something he recognized:

"You have a month on this island and when I come back for you, you must tell me the meaning behind this phrase - All Is One, One Is All."

Alphonse woke up with a start, sweating; not with fear, but with excitement. He knew who this person was! Teacher! Izumi-sama! He interpreted the dream as telling him he must return to her in Dublith and resume his training in alchemy. It was only through alchemy he would find Brother. He was so excited, he couldn't go back to sleep. As soon as he heard movement on the floors below, he raced downstairs and bowed to Granny Pinako,and apologizedfor his behavior. When Winry and Rose awoke, he apologized to them too. At breakfast, he told them about his dream and what he thought it meant. They were confused, but supportive; it was Winry who suggested he write to Izumi first instead of just showing up at her doorstep.

Right after breakfast he grabbed pen and paper, and composed a letter to Izumi, asking her to accept him as a student again. After putting it out for the mailman, he raced around the house for an hour, doing chores as extra penance for his rudeness. But excitement can only last so long, and the lack of sleep caused him to crash on the sofa. He dreamt an exciting dream of battling bad men on a train - Brother sending men much larger than himself flying - and he, Alphonse, getting in his licks too - before helping Brother subdue their leader. He awoke a few hours later with a smile, knowing he had done the right thing.

**Author's note again:** Ohhh-kaaayyy. This is turning out to be much longer than the one shot I'd envisaged; so I'm going to call this a prologue. A setting of the stage, if you will. What is hard to believe is I just sat down with Word Pad and composed this on the fly, it came together much more easily than if I'd written longhand in a notebook first. Better quit now, before this note gets longer than the story!


	2. Chapter 2

**All The Ice Cream You Can Eat**

2: The Bedridden Alchemist

**Warning:** Post series and pre movie; this story may contain spoilers for both.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own FMA nor any of the characters. I just like to play in it's world for awhile.

**Rating:** T, just to be on the safe side, there might be mild cursing later.

**Author's note:** Would you believe I wrote this back in MARCH!

After what seemed like an agonizingly long wait - just five days actually - but it felt like a year to an impatient ten year old - Izumi sent her answer. Just one word - "Come" - and she'd enclosed a second-class train ticket. Alphonse was so excited, he tried and failed several times to properly pack a suitcase, so Granny Pinako did it for him. All the way to the train station in the village, he only half listened to the lectures Winry and Rose gave him about proper behavior on the train and at Izumi's house.

When the Dublith-bound train finally arrived, he was jigging madly in place while Rose spat on a handkerchief and used it to wipe jam residue from around his mouth while he protested "I'm not a baby any more!" This was his first solo train trip and he couldn't wait to get going. As the train chuffed from the platform, he leaned out the window and waved until he couldn't see Rose and Winry anymore. Alphonse watched the country side fly past for a while, but that got boring after twenty minutes, and he eventually fell asleep, using his suitcase as a pillow.

When the conductor called "Next stop, Central!" he woke up quickly, excited all over again, to see the capitol city of Amestris. It was distinctly underwhelming, and Alphonse was happy to leave it behind as the train started southward from Central; through Palm, New Optain, Rush Valley, and finally - DUBLITH. Not only Izumi, but also her husband, Sigu came to meet him. And if Izumi was surprised to see a ten year old, and not a fourteen year old boy, she never let it show on her face. But it was hard to surprise Izumi Curtis anymore, she had seen so much.

Training would start the next day, so Alphonse was sent to bed early; Izumi would have him up at dawn for exercise. A light breakfast followed, while Izumi quizzed Alphonse to find out what he already knew. He had retained quite a bit of what she had previously taught him, but it was obvious there were woeful gaps in his alchemy education. On the good side, the boy was eager to learn, and easier to train than Edward had been.

Alphonse happily settled into his new routine: up at dawn, workout, breakfast, training, lunch, then more training until supper. He soaked up knowledge like a sponge and made only a very few errors, and consequently Izumi handed out comparatively mild disciplinary beatings. He grew stronger in both mind and body, and each night before going to sleep, he would repeat his mantra: "Soon, Brother, I will find you!"

* * *

However... 

He'd just passed the six month anniversary of his arrival at Dublith when he awoke one morning with a fever and sore throat, bad enough to make morning exercise difficult. Alphonse tried to hide his discomfort, but when Izumi noticed his reddened face, she cut the work out short and ordered him back to bed. The soreness made swallowing difficult, so Izumi alchemically brewed throat medicine and gave him a tablespoon of it once an hour. It helped - a little - the fever went down, but the pain in his throat came back, and was even worse the next day.

Alphonse was now thoroughly miserable, and his throat hurt very badly, even when he didn't swallow. Izumi went to work on stronger medicines - they tasted bad - so she mixed them with rich beef broths which she fed to him a spoonful at a time. She was an excellent cook and the broth was delicious, but the medicines didn't work - the pain kept coming back. When Izumi felt under his jaw, she noticed hard swellings, and just gently touching them made Alphonse wince and pull away. She was obviously dealing with a chronic condition - Alphonse would need the help of a traditional Hippocratic healer.

The pediatric healer, Dr. Uhuru, was a cheerful lady who tried her best to put the unhappy Alphonse at his ease. She seemed to know at once what the problem was, but she was also tactful enough to confirm it with Izumi. Putting a tongue depressor in his mouth, she used a small flashlight to point out two fleshy swellings partway down his throat.

"See those Miz Curtis?"

A cool nod was Izumi's reply.

"Those are his tonsils all swollen like that and making the poor boy miserable, I'm afraid they will have to be removed before he gets better!"

"Tonsillitus?" Sigu said that night, after Izumi had put Alphonse to bed. "Poor kid. On the good side, a new pediatric hospital opened here last year, so you won't have to take him all the way to Central to get them taken out."

Izumi flashed a brief smile in reply. "I'll take him there tomorrow and he'll undergo the surgery the day after that."

She packed a small overnight bag for him that evening; and Sigu took the next morning off from his butcher shop to lend support to them. Alphonse wasn't thrilled by the prospect of surgery, but he couldn't take much more of the pain his tonsils were causing him.

* * *

Dublith was small enough they were able to walk there from the house, the new pediatric hospital being only a mile away. It was a cheerful looking building: four stories high, it's outer bulk was broken up with bays, and punctuated with lots of windows, the whole painted in bright, primary colors which befitted a hospital dedicated to caring for children. 

Izumi nodded in approval at the main entrace to the hospital, a series of arched entryways which progressively became smaller as they approached the street made it look inviting, the smaller scale obviously designed to reassure nervous patients. On one level, Alphonse knew he had nothing to fear, but he stopped short before the doors and hung back. He had a feeling he couldn't explain to either Sigu or Izumi: this place gave him bad vibes.

It took Sigu getting down on one knee and talking gently to Alphonse for a few minutes to persuade the boy to enter the building. Once inside, they walked through a cheery, sunlight and plant-filled atrium to the main desk. Sigu kept a hand on Alphonse's back with his fingers rubbing it in gentle circles, he could feel the boy trembling under his touch. Izumi turned and frowned at Alphonse, she could sense his growing unease, as if he was ready to bolt, and it made her strangely irritable.

An instant later, her mood was broken when a teenage girl in a pink and white striped uniform bounced up to her and chirped "Good morning, ma'am!" Izumi'a eyes flashed at the word _ma'am_. "May I have the patient's name, please?"

"Alphonse Elric." Izumi gave her a slightly creepy smile. When she had to, she could do _shiny, happy_ too, although it made her teeth throb.

"And what procedure is Alphonse here for?" asked the perky candy striper, who either didn't feel Izumi's death-ray look, or she was pretending she didn't.

"A tonsillectomy."

The girl turned her syrupy smile on Alphonse, who started like he'd just seen something _terrifying_, it clearly said _you poor thing, I'm glad I'm not in your shoes_.

The girl nodded and made a notation on the clipboard she carried, then chriped again. "If you will walk this way please, I will take you to the exam room." She turned to her right and practically _skipped_ away, which caused Izumi to give Sigu and Alphonse a sharp look which clearly said _don't you dare!_

* * *

The admitting process started with a physical exam from a way-too-cheerful intern who took Al's pulse, listened to his heart and lungs (with a _very_ cold stethoscope), and weighed him. Alphonse slapped his hand away when he tried to touch the swellings under his jaw - his throat was by now extremely sore - but the intern didn't seem too perturbed. 

But when the man approached him with a needle and tried to take a sample of his blood, Alphonse objected so strongly, both Izumi and Sigu had to step in to calm him down. He held his breath and looked away as a finger tip was pricked, and blood filled a small tube.

"Now then, that wasn't so bad, was it?" the intern chirped in an almost perfect imitation of the candy striper's.

Alphonse scowled back - he was in agony - why was everyone so damn cheerful?

He could walk perfectly well, but a nurse took over and made him sit in a wheel chair to be taken to the children's ward. It was all a lot of bother over nothing as he was able to get out of the chair and go behind a privacy screen to put pajamas on before climbing into the hospital bed. The ward was full of other kids - a few his age - but most younger; nearly of them also admitted for tonsillectomies.

"It's like a tonsil plague." Sigu muttered.

Now the admitting process was done, it was time for the adults to leave. Sigu ruffled his hair and gruffly muttered "Be a good boy now".

Then Izumi lightly kissed his forehead before she murmured to him "Your throat will be very sore after the surgery, so you can have all the ice cream you can eat afterwards. What's your favorite flavor? Vanilla? Chocolate? Strawberry?"

Alphonse just smiled andnodded after each question- as long as he could have _ice cream_, the flavor didn't matter. Izumi gave him one last smile before following Sigu out, and then he was alone.

Alphonse clutched the thin bed sheet to his chest and wondered what was coming next. He soon found out when a no-nonsense nurse in a highly starched uniform walked up to his bedside, flipped him over on his stomach, pulled down his pajama bottoms and stuck a thermometer where the sun doesn't shine.

The boy uttered a startled "Urk!" and looked back in shock. He tried to pull his pajamas back up, but she slapped his hands away with a preemptory "Stop that!" Alphonse could feel his face warming with redness - he felt every kid in the ward was staring and pointing at him - his blush deepened to _kill me now before I die of embarrassment_ proportions. This couldn't possibly get any worse.

Yes, it could.

**Author's note:** OK, I used some artistic license in the finger sticking department, but I remember the embarrassing agony of that damn thermometer. Poor little Alphonse, it's about to get worse for him.


	3. Chapter 3

**All The Ice Cream You Can Eat**

3. This Too Shall Pass

**Warning:** This story is set between the series and the movie, so there may be mild spoilers.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own FMA nor it's characters, except any OCs. I just like to play around in it's world for awhile.

**Rating:** T, for some mild cursing, and disgusting things like rectal thermometers.

After what seemed to be an eternity, the nurse finally removed the darned thermometer-from-hell, but Alphonse's trials weren't over yet. Another attempt to pull his pajama pants back up resulted in a stern, "We're not done yet!"

From the cloth covered metal pan the nurse had set at the foot of the bed earlier, she withdrew an already filled hypodermic needle seemed so large it had to be the type used only for giants.

Alphonse's eyes widened in horror; was she going to really use that on him? Apparently so. "This will help you relax", said the demon nurse. "If it bothers you, turn away and don't look."

He did so before burying his face into the pillow, opening his mouth and biting down hard on the low weave cotton. It helped - a little - because the injection hurt - it really, really hurt. Alphonse didn't understand why he needed to get a shot to help him 'relax', or why the needle had to be stuck in his hind end. At this moment in time, the ways of adults made absolutely no sense to him.

At last, at long last, it was over. She pushed Al's pajama pants up over his stinging bottom, then threw the sheet over him and left him alone to stew in his humiliation. Alphonse turned over - slowly - to his left side (she had "needled" his right cheek) - drew himself into a fetal position - and pulled the sheet up until it was over his head.

He stayed in this postion until lunchtime, when another brusque nurse (Alphonse wondered if these women were manufactured somewhere in a Rude Nurse Factory, or if they went to a special Rude Nurse school in order to learn how to treat patients like this), yanked the sheet off his head, and hauled him into a sitting up position on the bed. He barely stifled a squeak of pain.

After pulling a tray table over to him, she slapped a steaming hot bowl of what looked like pale yellow water down, clattered a spoon next to it and told him to eat while it's hot. Alphonse stirred it without enthusiasm - what was it? He tried one little taste, but only succeeded in burning the tip of his tongue. The nurse gave him the 'Hairy Eyeball' when she saw he wasn't eating, "It's chicken soup, and it won't taste good if you let it get cold!"

_Was she serious?_

It didn't taste good hot either - he tried a little more and it only tasted like hot water in which a chicken had been dipped a few times, maybe the chicken had been allowed to sit on the side of the cooking pot and paddle it's feet. Even Winry's cooking was better than this. Had Brother ever cooked? A very faint memory at the back of his mind said 'yes' - once or twice - not very well - but it was probably more edible than this. He wished for Izumi's cooking - her chicken soup was rich and flavorful; but this hospital food was - he couldn't think of a word to describe how awful it was.

Now the nurse noticed he wasn't showing much enthusiasm for the 'soup', and she was right in his face. "Your surgery will be early tomorrow morning, so you can't have any supper. This will be your last chance to eat for twenty-four hours."

As long as only hospital food was in the offing, it was twenty-four hours too soon for Al. He reluctantly picked up the spoon again and manfully slurped at the "chicken soup" for a few minutes before the nurse mercifully snatched the bowl and spoon away, and Alphonse could get back to pretending he wasn't there. He dozed on and off all day until that evening when another Rude Nurse brought supper. From the smell, he guessed it was something masquerading as "beef stew", Alphonse was so _very_ thankful he wouldn't be expected to eat any.

He slept fitfully through the night, and awoke with a start because a noise had roused him. The ward was cold and dark, and another kid at the far end could be heard whimpering faintly while in the grip of a bad dream. Alphonse raised his head and looked over his shoulder at the window where a faint red line could be seen at the horizon. Almost dawn - if not for his tonsils, he would be getting up for morning exercise by now.

He had just lowered his head and closed his eyes again when the double doors to the ward shot open, and a similar starched nurse - perhaps it was a twin to the one he'd seen the morning before came in, carrying a cloth-covered tray. Alphonse shuddered and pulled the sheet over his head and he thought _Maybe if I lay very, very still, perhaps she won't see me._

No such luck. The sheet was yanked off, he was flipped onto his stomach like he was a dead fish she was inspecting for dinner, his pajama bottoms were pulled down and here came that damn thermometer. Alphonse stifled a gasp when it went in - _I think she stores it on ice between uses_! But the ordeal wasn't _quite _over after the thermometer was withdrawn. When he heard a clatter in the pan, Al knew what was coming next, and he bit down on his pillow. It hurt as much as ever, but she left him alone to huddle under the sheet when she was done.

Alphonse had just dozed off again when the doors burst open a second time, and the sheet was yanked off again. His visitors this time were two large and unsmiling men who lifted him up and roughly deposited him on a gurney. He wasn't allowed to stay in that comforting fetal position, for they made him lay on his back (_Ouch!_), and lay _still_.

Any attempt to move - or even sit up, got him a callused hand on his shoulder or chest which pushed him into proper position. He was wheeled down apparently endless hallways which smelled of diluted bleach until the gurney rammed through a set of swinging doors into a room filled with very bright light.

One man grabbed his shoulders, the other his feet and on the count of three, slung him off the gurney and onto a padded table which was slightly higher. Alphonse raised his head a bit to look around, the room was quite large compared to the ward he'd been in, and the walls were covered in a white tile to a height of perhaps six feet. There the tile was replaced by glass, and he could see a few faces staring back at him. Even the ceiling was painted white, but he couldn't see the color of the floor. The whole effect was one of ruthless _cleanliness_, and indeed the room smelled strongly of some sort of disinfectant.

The table appeared to be in the center of the room, and it's head end was surrounded with machines which beeped quietly. About halfway down the table on his right was a small wheeled table which held a silver tray filled with gleaming silver objects - mostly small knives which looked very sharp. _Scalpels_, thought Al, and he shuddered reflexively.

The two men with calloused hands left with the gurney, and two masked and gowned figures took over. He could only see their eyes, but they looked to be of the same species of Rude Nurse. One pushed his head back down before she threw green surgical drapes over him, which covered him from his toes to his neck. The other rubbed a harsh-smelling liquid over his left hand before she (he? it?) stuck a fine gauge needle into a vein, and taped it down, doing it so quickly he didn't have time to wince. "Just relax," she told him in a brisk but muffled voice, "you'll start to feel drowsy very soon." He could hear her move behind him and start to fiddle with the beeping equipment.

Alphonse didn't believe her at first, but he gradually began to feel a strange heavy feeling in his mind, and his vision started to blur slightly. A third figure wandered into his field of view, yet another caped and gowned woman whom the others addressed as "Doctor." She smiled down at Alphonse - at least, he thought she smiled - it was hard to tell with the mask on. But the skin around her grey eyes crinkled into smile lines, and an upward curved shadow appeared on her mask. So she might have smiled, but Al was now feeling very groggy, so he wasn't sure of anything.

This figure nodded to the woman who had put the IV into his hand. And the latter person placed a black rubber mask which made a hissing noise over his nose and mouth, and told him breathe deeply and count backwards from 100. The drug dripping into his veins must have been confusing him because the voice now sounded like Teacher's and it was best to do what she said.

So Alphonse took a deep breath, and began to recite a backwards count:

_"100, 99, 98, 97, 9..6, 9...5, 9...4, 9..."_

**Author's note:** OK, we won't go into the minutae of a tonsillectomy. IMHO: The less Alphonse knows what happens, the better. Hasn't the poor boy suffered enough?


	4. Chapter 4

**All The Ice Cream You Can Eat**

Epilogue

**Warning:** This story is set between the series and the movie, may contain mild spoilers of both

**Disclaimer**: I don't own FMA nor any of the canon characters (just the OCs); I just like to play around in it's world for awhile.

**Rating:** T, just to be safe due to mild cursing

Alphonse began dreaming soon after the ether delivered it's knockout punch, and they were fragmented, troubling dreams: he and Brother fled thorough the rain from a scarred man, he saw Brother kneel down and talk to a doglike creature which spoke like a human, then Brother tried to fight - and failed against this horrid creature with green hair. He also dreamed he was fighting a suit of armor with a skull for a head, then he was being eaten by a fat bald man with empty white eyes, and worst of all, Alphonse dreamed he was laying helpless in the street of a deserted town, unable to move as a red light rushed towards him...

"GAHHH!" He awoke with a jolt in what seemed total darkness.

"Alphonse, you've just had a bad dream, it's all right." A familiar voice spoke to him, so hee blinked his eyes to clear them, and saw he was laying back in his hospital bed, and a night light was banishing the darkness. Izumi sat next to the bed in a hard chair and watched him with appraising eyes for a moment before she leaned forward and put a hand on his forehead and her scowl deepened.

"Huh, those idiots" she grunted "You were still in the recovery room when you started hemorrhaging, they couldn't stop the bleeding at first and they had to take you back to surgery twice. Now you've picked up a fever, and no wonder, this place is so unsanitary."

She replaced her hand with a cool, damp cloth. It felt very good against his hot skin, and Alphonse made an appreciative noise in his throat. "It's my fault, Alphonse, I should have taken you to the pediatric hospital in Central, I'm sorry."

"Teacher?"

"If you want to know, you've been here for four days. All the other kids who had tonsillectomies the same day have already gone home. Once the main desk is open, I'm checking you out of here, because you're not going to get better in this pest hole."

Alphonse swallowed experimentally - his throat felt dry and scratchy, but the pain, and feelings of constriction were gone. "Do you want some water?"

Izumi put a hand under his neck to gently lift his head up, and put a glass against his lips. The water was cool and delicious, but she only let him have a few sips. "After no solid food for all these days, too much water will upset your stomach."

She set him back down on the pillow. "It's only 2 AM, so we've got a few hours yet, get a little sleep now."

Alphonse really doubted he could get back to sleep, but he dozed off and on for a few hours. About 7 AM the surgeon came to check on his stitches - after a few tense minutes, she pronounced them as holding fine and gave Izumi the go-ahead to take him home

His legs felt a little shaky, so she helped him change back into street clothes - this time he welcomed the nurse with the wheelchair because he wasn't sure if he could walk that far.

There were already new kids on the pre-surgery ward, as they headed out the double swinging doors, Alphonse saw that same nurse again, and she was holding the same cloth-covered tray as she waited for them to get out of her way. He knew what was coming for some poor new arrival, and he didn't envy that kid one bit.

"Alphonse?" Izumi looked concerned. "Your face turned white when you saw that nurse, what did she do to you?"

Suddenly afraid Izumi would go to confront the woman - or worse, beat her up, Alphonse quickly shook his head. "You don't want to know, Teacher. Please trust me, you don't want to know."

Mason - Sigu's apprentice - was waiting for them at the exit. He picked Al up as if he weighed no more than a feather and carried him to the Curtis house. He tried to make some small talk

"How was the hospital food?"

"Did you see any pretty nurses?"

"Were they nice to you in the operating room?"

But Alphonse answered only in monosyllables and nods, or shakes of his head, so Mason eventually gave up.

The day was already heating up, so Al asked if he could sit in the backyard instead of going to bed. Izumi looked at him strangely for a moment, but finally nodded her assent. While she did something in the kitchen, Al sat on a wooden bench next to the back door and basked in the sun as if his life depended on it. It seemed years since he'd last seen it - Al raised his head and closed his eyes, letting it's rays wash away his memories and the smells of the hospital. He must have dozed off, for he was startled awake when the back door banged.

Al kept his eyes closed, but he could hear the soft slap of Izumi's slippers approaching him. He could also hear a metal spoon rattling in a china bowl - odd - he assumed the bowl contained soup, but he couldn't smell anything. Now he felt a cold spoon at his lips; "Open your mouth, Alphonse," said Izumi.

Izumi had a particular tone of voice she used when she wanted instant obedience, so Al didn't hesitate to do what she ordered. The spoon slid over his teeth - and an instant later, his mouth was flooded with a sweet and creamy taste. The distinctive flavors of chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry.

Ice cream!

_Fin_

**Author's note:** I hope you enjoyed this fluffy little nugget of Alphonse-centric goodness; and the best way to show your appreciation is with a review.


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